"Lost" films you'd like to see!

[Amy Jeanne]

I always torture myself with this subject!

SAVED FROM THE TITANIC (1912)
Would've been a great historical document today. An actual Titanic survivor tells her story in a 10 minute flashback! The first ever movie about the disaster, released one month afterwards. It's supposedly been lost since 1914.

HOLLYWOOD (1923)
I'd love to see this for all the wonderful cameos. I imagine it to be a more quaint version of Show People. Too bad Paramount is notorious for not giving a hoot about their silent films.

ROUGH HOUSE ROSIE (1927)
I just want to see this for the cute factor.

It's Great To Be Alive (1933)
Don't let the phony review on imdb fool you -- this movie is LOST. In it, women clamor for the last fertile man on earth -- all the others have been stricken with "masculitis." It sounds delightfully pre-Code!

CONVENTION CITY (1933)
Most of us know that this movie was deliberately destroyed in the 40s. It supposedly brought on the crackdown of the Production Code and was absolutely UNFIT to be reissued after 1934!! We may never know how true this is...



What do you want to see but probably never will?

 

[Senator Jack]

It's so sad to think about these films. I think I read that Hollywood produced over 400 films a year and over half of those prior to 1940 are lost. What a shame.

 

[happyfilmluvguy]

It's a bit like everything else from the past. Hardly anyone at the time thought they'd have value in the future. And many have no proof of being lost and so they are only considered lost. I'd like to imagine how much footage was/is out there of just atmosphere. The loss of films is one thing but can you imagine how many people might have just filmed a street corner? Home movies on the studio lot and beyond? How many screen tests of actors and actresses that never made it. There is so much more than what we are lead to believe. That's what I'd like to see. Raw footage.

 

[Amy Jeanne]

It's a bit like everything else from the past. Hardly anyone at the time thought they'd have value in the future. And many have no proof of being lost and so they are only considered lost. I'd like to imagine how much footage was/is out there of just atmosphere. The loss of films is one thing but can you imagine how many people might have just filmed a street corner? Home movies on the studio lot and beyond? How many screen tests of actors and actresses that never made it. There is so much more than what we are lead to believe. That's what I'd like to see. Raw footage.

I'd like to see that kind of stuff, too. Raw footage of the Victorian era always fascinates me -- even more so than my beloved 20s and 30s. My dad has home movies from as far back as 1941 when his mother was pregnant with him (some are even IN COLOUR!) We also have unknown reels of silent comedy shorts in our closet. I have no idea what they are because the beginnings have been cut off. [huh] I didn't recognize anyone in them when I watched them.

 

[Midnight Palace]

I'd like to see "Alias Jimmy Valentine" with Leila. It was her first talkie (silent-talkie hybrid). It is said to be lost, although from my understanding, one copy is in existence with a private collector in the UK.

 

[happyfilmluvguy]

I'd like to see that kind of stuff, too. Raw footage of the Victorian era always fascinates me -- even more so than my beloved 20s and 30s. My dad has home movies from as far back as 1941 when his mother was pregnant with him (some are even IN COLOUR!) We also have unknown reels of silent comedy shorts in our closet. I have no idea what they are because the beginnings have been cut off. [huh] I didn't recognize anyone in them when I watched them.

Have you considered transferring them to VHS or DVD or done so already? They can be preserved if digitized.

If there was another media other than celluloid film at the time, I can imagine more films would be with us today. At least if it could last longer and wasn't too expensive to use. "Film" has become pricey over the years.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I keep waiting for them to find the rest of "Gold Diggers of Broadway," the second all-Technicolor musical made by Warner Bros. in 1929 -- and the blueprint for the whole series of "Gold Diggers" films that would follow in the early '30s. It was a huge success -- for a long time it was the second-highest-grossing film Warners ever made -- and it was still being reissued as late as 1939, by which time the vast majority of early talkies had long since been buried in the vaults.

And yet, by the mid-fifties, not a single print was known to exist in the world. The last known copy was held by the Warner Bros. exchange in England, but it disappeared in the early fifties, and since then only about twenty minutes worth of fragments -- plus all of the Vitaphone soundtrack discs -- have been found. I've seen those fragments, and if the rest of the film is ever found, fans of the early-talkie-musical era will have a real treat in store!

 

[K.D. Lightner]

London After Midnight, a 1927 silent film starring Lon Chaney as the vampire.

karol

 

[Midnight Palace]

I don't think London After Midnight is lost, TCM showed it a few months ago. Here is a photo for Alias Jimmy Valentine....

Come to think of it, there are other films of Leila's that I believe are lost:

Sandra (1924) - her first film, despite many sources that claim "Dancing Mothers" to be her first film

The Crimson City (1928)

Land of the Silver Fox (1927)

Wonder of Women (1929)

 

[HadleyH]

I agree with everybody who mentioned lost musicals and romantic films of the 20s an 30s, it'd be a dream for me to watch them all!
Also I'd like to watch (mainly for the spooky factor) that much discussed movie directed by Ted Browning in 1927 and now lost for ever ,"London After Midnight".

 

[K.D. Lightner]

I hope you are correct.

I understood that the last copy of the film was lost in a fire in 1965. Also, a reconstruction was attempted by Turner Classics, they tried to reproduce the film through stills.

Also, I read that someone owns a copy of the film and refuses to release it so a copy can be made. Can't imagine why anyone would do that.

karol

 

[HadleyH]

I hope you are correct.

I hope you are correct too!

 

[LizzieMaine]

A few years ago, one of the more enterprising regulars on alt.movies.silent put together an extremely convincing "London After Midnight Found!" hoax website that's taken in more than a few people -- http://michaelgebert.com/lam/lam1.html

It's extremely clever, extremely convincing, and -- alas -- entirely bogus.

 

[K.D. Lightner]

Oh, bummer -- that really was convincing.

I thought maybe the person who allegedly has a copy of the film had pirated copies made and sold to others who wanted it for their private collections and were willing to pay a high price.

karol

 

[MrNewportCustom]

Any of the short films by Robert Benchley.


Lee
_________________

“It took me fifteen years to discover that I had no talent for writing, but I couldn't give it up because by that time I was too famous.” - Robert Benchley

 

[CharlieH.]

Just about any of the early two-colour Technicolor films, from The Gulf Between all the way to The Rogue Song. That along with whatever Kinemacolor footage was shot during the 1900's.

 

[LadyStardust]

Apparently there's a silent version of Wuthering Heights somewhere in the great, wide world. I would love love love to see that.

 

[GeniusInTheLamp]

I'd like to see the missing Charlie Chan movies (CHARLIE CHAN CARRIES ON, CHARLIE CHAN'S CHANCE, CHARLIE CHAN'S COURAGE, CHARLIE CHAN'S GREATEST CASE).

Also missing are the early Vitagraph movies, most of which were destroyed in a warehouse fire around 1915. One of those movies shows baseball great Honus Wagner teaching a very young Moe Howard how to play baseball.

I'd also like to see the first Marx Brothers movie, HUMORISK (even if it was reportedly nothing special, it's still interesting in an historical context).

Also, a color print of the Fox & Crow cartoon MYSTO-FOX.

I recently read that several missing movies have been found over the past few years in Australia and New Zealand. When the movies were distributed, those countries were usually the last stop. Due to high shipping costs, many of these movies just stayed there.